“Perhaps the worst day of Santiago Montoya’s life was April 6 of this year. That’s when he was hit by a car while on the job as a cable car operator. The collision destroyed his body, and he is still recovering in a Concord hospital."

Tuesday night was the 31st year of National Night Out, an event that aims to help prevent crime by encouraging people get to know their neighbors and strengthen their communities. We sent reporters out to National Night Out gatherings all over the Bay Area to see what was going on.

Alvin Kwok is a tutor with ROCK at Visitacion Valley Middle School. He told Hear Here about his family, who has lived in Visitacion Valley since his grandmother first immigrated there from China. She’s been working hard ever since to make a loving home for her family.

Viola Rusca has been watching San Francisco evolve for over nine decades. She shared some of her childhood memories from growing up in Visitacion Valley with our Hear Here community storytelling project.

"Well everything was dirt," Rusca remembers about the streets in her neighborhood. "Because I remember my father... the Italians liked to play bocce ball. Because our street was dirt, his friends would come on Sunday and play bocce ball."

Astor Lee shared her story with KALW's Hear Here project at the Visitacion Valley library branch. She told us about how the art of Tai Chi helped create a sense of community for recent immigrants to the neighborhood.